


Yes, Inquisitor

by tourmalily



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Drinking & Talking, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, Language, Love, M/M, Relationship(s), S&M, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-20
Updated: 2016-09-20
Packaged: 2018-08-16 09:40:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8097256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tourmalily/pseuds/tourmalily
Summary: Cullen surprises the Inquisitor with a request; after a pep-talk with The Iron Bull, she's ready to give him what he's looking for. Let there be smut and pillow-talk! Also Iron Bull and Dorian in future chapters.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why this seized me but it keeps bouncing around in my head so I have to write it down.

“I can’t do it, Bull.” Ellana guzzled another mouthful of whatever horrid stuff it was that The Iron Bull kept in a flask, handily tucked away in his sash. She choked and coughed, much to Bull’s amusement. He grabbed the container from her shaking grasp and took a long pull himself before tucking it back in its place.

“”Course you can, Boss.” He rumbled evenly, giving her a rough pat on the back. “You love him, he loves you, he wants you to tie him up and beat him, and then you fuck each other senseless.” He made a clucking noise with his tongue. Ellana looked horrified.

“Shit, Bull! Don’t say that so loud!” She shout-whispered, glancing around the bar. The Herald’s Rest was packed with the usual crowd. Cabot was rinsing and drying tankards across the bar, and Maryden was taking musical requests from drunken soldiers. A loud and decidedly off-key rendition of “Andraste’s Mabari” had started somewhere on the first floor and was spreading like wildfire up to the second. In short, she needn’t have worried, but paranoia gripped the Inquisitor and she looked furtively about for spies and eavesdroppers.

“Inquisitor, seriously?” Bull looked at her with his one eye, head cocked so his horns tilted at a comical angle. “You really think someone cares _that much_ who you’re fucking that they’d send a Venatori agent to spy on you?”  Ellana threw up her hands.

“All right, all right. But you can’t blame me for wanting to be discreet. If anyone found out, I…it could ruin him, Bull. I can’t, I won’t be responsible for that. Not after everything he’s done for the Inquisition—for me.” She shook her head and covered her face with her palms.

“By the Creators, I love him. I _love him_. Fuck, I don’t know what to do.”

 Bull leaned back in his chair and gave her a sidelong look. Her eyes were still red from crying, and her hair was unkempt. Her normally fastidious attire was unbuttoned down the neck. He’d found her hacking away at a sparring dummy with that magic-y sword in the dark and steered her straight to the bar. Two drinks later and he’d coaxed the torrid tale from the Inquisitor, about Cullen’s unorthodox sexual request, and how she’d fled in a panic.

“Have another drink; you’re going to need it.” He pushed a full tankard of ale in her direction, and she gulped it down.

“For what?”

“Um, for when you go back up there? You can’t just leave him like that.” Bull said casually, addressing the air before him more than the Inquisitor. She shook her head. She gripped her tankard in desperation, knuckles white.

“I can’t face him right now. I need time, or something.”  Bull grunted in frustration.

“Look, sometimes, it’s not all about you and what _you_ need in a relationship. Sometimes, it’s what you need to do for your partner. That man trusted you enough with this, so you owe it to him to honor that trust.” Ellana looked up sharply. Bull had never uttered a cross word to her before, but this was as close to a rebuke as she’d ever heard from him. It stung, and her hackles rose. She became defensive.

“And what would a Qunari know about relationships?” She regretted it before the words were out of her mouth. Bull could have had her by the throat. Instead he snarled at her.

“Don’t you mean, what would a _Tal-Vashoth_ know about relationships?”

It had been three months since the Dreadnought was destroyed, since he’d been cast out by his people. Tal-Vashoth, they called him. She gritted her teeth. She’d been so angry for him.

“I’m sorry, Bull—I didn’t mean…” she sighed heavily. “That was a really shitty thing for me to say. Can you forgive me?” He gave her a lopsided grin.

“Ahh, we’re all right, you and me. You’re drunk. And besides, you’re not really angry with me. You’re angry with yourself, because you’re scared that you’re going to fuck up.” Ellana’s brows furrowed in indignation.

“Really. _I’m_ the problem?” Bull nodded appreciably, as though instructing a particularly wayward child. She sat back, arms crossed, awaiting the lecture.

“Yup. Thing is, you’ve had a pretty good run for most of your life. Being Dalish, you probably spent a lot of time, oh I don’t know, frolicking through forests and picking daisies and shit like that. Sure, you had to worry about Templars and human crap from time to time, but until you went to spy on the Conclave, I’ll wager you had it pretty good. Especially being your Keeper’s First. Am I right so far?” The Inquisitor acknowledged him with a raised eyebrow.

“So far…”

Bull pounded the table.

“So, not everyone else had such a great time. Cullen was in the Circle Tower during the Fifth Blight. You know what happened there, right? Some asshole named Uldred tried to take over, demons and abominations, wholesale slaughter, the usual shit, until the Hero of Ferelden came and fixed it. ”

Ellana nodded slowly.

“Then he gets sent to Kirkwall, and guess what? More bullshit! The Arishok tries to invade and slaughters a bunch of people, blood magic happens, then there’s mages fighting Templars fighting mages in the streets, red lyrium drives his commanding officer insane, he has to help kill her…then the Conclave happens. _Boom_. Doesn’t sound like a particularly good time, does it? And that’s the last ten years of Cullen’s life, in a nutshell.” Bull punctuated his speech with another mouthful of ale, setting the tankard back on the table with a dull _clunk._

“He…well, he told me what happened to him.”  In truth, his anguished words sometimes echoed in her ears. _I was tortured. They tried to break my mind, and I….how can you be the same person, after that? Still, I wanted to serve…_

Bull gave her an appraising stare. She flinched under his stern gaze.

“Wait, hold up. He actually told you everything that happened? Like, the stuff that isn’t common knowledge? The, ‘stuff-that-Red-probably-knows-about-him-but-would-never-ask’ stuff?” Ellana shifted uncomfortably in her chair. She brushed a strand of hair behind her ear to avoid looking at him.

“He…might have given me the details, yes.”  Bull looked up at the ceiling as though he might find patience hanging from the rough-hewn boards.

“Okay, you need to stop talking to me _right now_ and go back to Cullen, and just, have a field day with him.”

Ellana let out an exasperated laugh.

“I don’t _understand_ , Bull. What the fuck are you trying to tell me?”

“Ungghhh. I’m trying to tell you that it’s obvious your Commander has been pretty badly tortured and it’s changed him, and he’s scared of whatever that means, but he loves you and trusts you. He wants to be closer to you.”

“By…asking _me_ to torture him?”

Bull shook his head.

“Not torture. You won’t go too far. There’ll be a safe word. Cullen will tell you when he’s had enough.” Ellana ran a hand through her hair. None of this was making sense.

“But how does this help him?”

“Think about how many decisions Cullen makes on a daily basis. Troop details, patrols, training, weapons inspection, orders. You’re the only person in the entire Inquisition who’s responsible for more lives. He bears the mantle of command well, but there’s a part of him that just wants to surrender. Maybe it’s trauma from the Ferelden circle, maybe it’s the lyrium withdrawal. Whatever the reason, he needs to submit to something, _someone,_ so he can be free for a little while.”

The Inquisitor was silent for a moment, considering.

“How do you know all this?”  The Qunari shrugged.

“Easy. When I was fighting in Seheron, before I burned myself out, I was still pretty fucked up.  There was this one Tamassran, though. She lived for stuff like that. Liked to use physical pleasure and pain to help get rid of mental anguish. I would go to her after I’d seen one too many civilians slaughtered in the streets that day.” He gestured to a line of pale raised scars on his sides. She hadn’t noticed them before—Bull was a mess of old and healing scars and tattoos. These scars were hardly enough to draw blood, and perfectly straight and parallel. Intentional. She gulped another mouthful of ale.

“Bull, I…uhh.”

“Haha, I know, right?” He laughed. “Guess maybe that’s not a mental imagine you really needed right now.” He tipped back his mug and took a swig. He felt Ellana’s hand reach into his sash, fumbling for the flask. He chuckled, and reached for it himself, handing it to her. He figured she could use a little more liquid courage, why not.

“Where d’you think you’re going with that?” He asked as she unscrewed the cap. He watched, impressed, as she downed the entire contents. Her face was flushed, but she didn’t choke this time. She gave him a feral grin.

“Where d’you _think_ I’m going, you big ass?” She taunted, a bit louder than she meant to, and gave a startled look around.  Reassured that there were still no Venatori spies lurking in the shadows, she leaned in closer to whisper.

“I’m going to go tie up my Commander, and then fuck his brains out.”  Bull raised his mug in salute.

“Nice! Enjoy it, Boss. _He_ will.”


End file.
